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Archive Delving - TUMULUS #5

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I'm back with another readthrough of my rpg archives! It's a little bit of a stretch to say TUMULUS 5 is really "archival" reading - this is the winter 2025 issue! That's right now! (Or it was when I started writing this blogpost - the spring 2026 issue drops very soon I believe). I was gifted a year's subscription for the winter holidays (thank you Nate), and got a chance to read it at the turn of the year. TUMULUS  is a quarterly magazine by Skeleton Code Machine. I don't have the back issues to compare to, but the copy tells us we can expect individual issues to run ~40-60 pages with illustration. The contents of those pages are a little variable, but the idea I get is that we can expect "game-stuff" in general - some theory, perhaps some reviews, maybe even some little games. The back of the issue has a full page ad for the magazine (more on this in just a moment), pitched as "quarterly inspiration, games, design ideas, and more." I...
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Rangers Upon the Coast - Quartermaster's Retrospective

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Whale Roads   was released December 2025. It's a "zine" that's a phenomenal labor of love and (in my entirely biased opinion) an extremely cool compilation of play reports, GM asides, player notes, and game materials, from the year-long West Marches / open table game of Wolves Upon the Coast , by Luke Gearing, organized through the Ranged Touch discord server. I was one of 30+ players, I wound up serving as the table's "quartermaster," and I was one of a handful of editors who worked on assembling the final zine, so I wanted to take the opportunity to reflect on my experience!
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Archive Delving - Mystery Flesh Pit National Park

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Adventure Calls took a break for April, so I thought I'd fill the time with another Archive Delve. Today I'll be talking about the Mystery Flesh Pit National Park rpg supplement!
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Review: Bloodthirsty (for Heart: The City Beneath)

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I've been continuing to mess around writing for Heart (in fact, you can read some more of my design work in the 70-page fanzine , recently published, which includes really fun writing from a plethora of others), so today I'm back with a review of Bloodthirsty , by E.R.F. Jordan! 
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Adventure Calls - A Pound of Flesh

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I'm back with another month's worth of adventure! For March, we read A Pound of Flesh , the Mothership module by by Donn Stroud, Sean McCoy, and Luke Gearing, with illustrations by McCoy and Jan Buragay. The text has two primary modes; one for establishing the setting, and one for running the three scenarios in the setting. I think both valences of the text are really good! So, once again, I'll be digging a little into the text to talk about what works for me and what didn't.
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Adventure Calls - 50 Fathoms

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For February, the Adventure Calls reading club read 50 Fathoms , a pulpy pirate-y pointcrawl / campaign setting for Savage Worlds. It's a big one! I wound up thinking a lot about the social fabric the text imagines.
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Adventure Calls - Against the Cult of the Reptile God

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For January (a month which, you might note, has already passed us by), the Adventure Calls reading club read Against the Cult of the Reptile God . I read it too! You can read other readers' thoughts here . Spoilers for the adventure follow! Content warnings for the module include mind control and sexual assault.
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